


She fades away

by leiaesthetic



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Anorexia, Depression, F/M, Mental Health Issues, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Pre-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:36:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27581477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiaesthetic/pseuds/leiaesthetic
Summary: Natasha Romanoff let a lot of things slide in the past months. Well actually since the snap 2 years ago. The only thing she “cooked “for herself were sandwiches or instant noodles that she never finished. She can’t remember the last time she did her laundry, nor when she last cleaned her room. But she couldn’t care less.
Relationships: Steve Rogers & Natasha Romanov, Steve Rogers/Natasha Romanov
Comments: 3
Kudos: 54





	She fades away

Natasha Romanoff let a lot of things slide in the past months. Well actually since the snap 2 years ago. The only thing she “cooked “for herself were sandwiches or instant noodles that she never finished. She can’t remember the last time she did her laundry, nor when she last cleaned her room. But she couldn’t care less. There was no one living on the compound but her, Steve had moved to the city half a year ago and with him the last bits of her self-reverence seemed to have left too. Whenever she wanted to get something done other than staring at the statistics of the snap, sitting in on yet another useless meeting with Captain Marvel, Rhodey and Rocket because deep down she knew that no one would find Clint if he didn’t wanna be found or punching the punching bag so hard until her knuckles were bleeding through the bandages, she asked herself “Why?” or “What for?”.

The way she neglected the tasks at hand just reflected the way she was letting herself go. Normal things just felt like too much- like she didn’t deserve it. Sometimes she didn’t eat anything for a whole day, always thinking of the people who could never eat anything ever again, partly because of her failure. That’s why her bones were showing more and more, you could practically count her ribs if she wore a tight shirt, and every pair of pants she owned hung loosely down her thin frame. She wasn’t more than a shadow of herself, but she couldn’t care less, not when the guilt was consuming her, haunting her every night in her dreams and she felt the need to bring this as a punishment upon herself. So, while she didn’t consciously starve herself, something inside her just kept her from eating or keeping a lot of food down.

So, when she stood in front of her closet that one morning, she wasn’t surprised when she was met with emptiness. Most of the few clothes she owned were laying around on the floor somewhere and needed to be washed. She picked up a black top from underneath her bed, but noticed it was a crop top when she had put it on. You could see how her belly was rather going inwards and how drastically her ribcage was standing out. She didn’t care how she looked, but she didn’t want to explain herself should there be another meeting with and Rhodey and the others. She took the short black top off, put on a pair of leggings that didn’t seem to have any stains on them and walked through the hallway into Steve’s former bedroom. 

It looked like he never left, he didn’t take a lot of things with him, like he was trying to leave it behind along with everything that reminded him that he also had failed to save the world from the snap. He came around from time to time, he cooked her dinner and (at least pretended to) listen to her when she was telling him about a new lead on Clint. But he never stayed overnight though. Natasha was glad, because then he didn’t notice when she threw up the food he made her as soon as she could see him leaving out the front door. On the other hand, even though she wouldn’t even admit that to herself, she felt like breaking down in front of him and begging him to stay every time he was about to leave. Whenever he was about to leave her behind, again. But she never did and he never stayed, because she was too damn good at keeping her composure and a part of her hated him for not noticing. 

Natasha always had loved Steve’s room because it was so uniquely him, old books in a shelf, his sketchpads and pencils laying on the coffee table, the record player next to his bed. Now she was in it she wanted nothing more than to run out, because it reminded her that not even Steve Rogers could endure being around her anymore. She went straight to where she was headed, took a grey shirt from the stack of neatly folded T-shirts in his closet and put it on. When she looked at herself in the mirror, she was content. Steve’s Shirt hung loosely of her shoulders and hid all the critical parts of her body. 

After she went for her morning run around the compound, she ate two bites of a peanut butter sandwich before going to the training room and stretching for her now daily ballet routine. She didn’t start doing it again because she particularly liked it, but because it hurts. So good. A part of her hated herself for how fucking happy she was after she first danced tiptoe after ten years or so and she felt her toes breaking. She felt happy when seeing her bleeding and bruised feet after taking off her pointe shoes. Natasha Romanoff felt like she deserved pain more than anyone. Why was she left alive and so many others had to die? 

She finished her training at about 1 PM and went back to her office space, the former meeting area of the Avengers. There were no new mails, no message from anybody so she just stared at the screen and basically waited for anything to pop up. She was so focused on the nothingness, that she didn’t notice when Steve’s car pulled up in the parking lot. She flinched when she heard him clearing his throat, startling her out of her deep focus on the screen in front of her. She didn’t notice his presence before.

“Hey.” Steve simply said, putting his jacket down on the chair in front of him and throwing his keys on the desk. She wondered why he still kept them. Natasha looked up at him and managed a small smile: “Hey soldier, what’s up.” It came out raspier and more broken than she anticipated and that was probably due to the fact that she hadn’t spoke to anybody in the last week. Steve lifted his brow: “You okay?” he asked out of concern but Natasha just huffed. “Now what do you expect me to say to that?” She looked away from him, out of the window to hide the tears that were filling her eyes, ready to spill. But she couldn’t let him see that, she didn’t want to force him to care for her because he felt responsible for her, even though that’s probably why he still came by.

“I’m sorry for asking, I know it’s stupid.” he said and she wondered when their relationship had become this difficult and tense. They had been so close before, when they were on the run and she sometimes thought that they could maybe be more than friends, but now she could feel that he was afraid of saying something wrong to her and she was afraid of revealing too much to him. “I came by because… I want to move back in if that’s okay with you. I don’t want you to have to look for Clint on your own, you shouldn’t have to manage this alone.” He looked at her and she knew it was an excuse. 

“There’s not much to do actually, I get by on my own pretty well.” Natasha told him, but the single tear that rolled down her cheek gave her away. Steve got up, walked over to her side of the table and him being so close to her broke down the last remains of her wall. She pressed her head against his chest and finally allowed herself to cry. When he put his arms around her, he was shocked. “Jesus, Nat you’ve gotten so thin. Are you eating?” he asked but she couldn’t answer, instead she only held onto him tighter. They stood there and time seemed to stop. Natasha only half registered when he picked her up and they moved to the living room, where he sat down on the couch, with her curled up in his lap like a ball, afraid of the inevitable conversation they would be having now.

Neither of them knew how much time had passed, but the sun was setting outside when Natasha slightly lifted her head to look at Steve. He also had stains of dried tears on his cheeks. He now cupped her face with his hands. “Please Nat, let me help you.” He sounded desperate. Natasha knew they were too far gone now but she also knew that words could never express what was going on. She could never say it out loud. So she stayed silent and lifted her hand for him to see instead. He took her bony fingers in his and pressed a soft kiss on her bruised knuckles. “I don’t want you to hurt yourself, please.” He was basically begging her. 

Natasha took all the courage she had left and whispered: ”Stay with me. Please don’t leave me again.” She thought she was expecting too much, despite him saying he wanted to move back in before, she needed him to be with her, to bear her panic attacks, her nightmares and to watch her eating and training habits. That was too much to ask. “I won’t, we’ll get through this Nat, I just need you to let me in. I’ll be with you no matter what.” He said and caressed her puffy cheeks. And she believed him. Not because she knew he was always honest but because how he had said it and just because he… She trusted him so much, it hurt. 

But he kept his word, he stayed the night holding her close to him in her bed and it was the first night in forever that she wasn’t woken up by nightmares. He stayed the next morning, making her breakfast and she felt how genuinely happy he was when she ate two pancakes. He stayed with her throughout the day, distracting her from her dark thoughts, training with her on a normal level, taking a walk down to the river with her. He stayed with her the next night and the nights to come and neither one of them had slept alone since that day. 

Steve Rogers gave Natasha Romanoff hope and the perspective that maybe, she could move on without forgetting and punishing herself. But equally, Natasha Romanoff gave Steve Rogers a purpose and the feeling that he wasn’t alone. It was a rough path, but the got through it, together and somewhere along the way, they were able to profess their feelings to one another. In a broken world, they had found light in each other.

He was her Salvation as she was his.


End file.
